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Another item you should have on your boat is KNOWLEDGE of how things work and what things do and where things are!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I heard a story of a friend that went out with his son on their boat. It was a tournament boat like we all have with a factory ballast system. One of the lines cracked on a ballast pump and before they knew it, they had water high enough in the cabin that the engine stalled out. They had to offload passengers to another boat that 'rescued' them and they called 911 and the coast guard came out.

Guess what? The boat owner didn't know where the SHUTOFF valve was to the through hull connection that fed his ballast pumps. Wow, just wow.

It's actually surprising that the boat didn't sink. Not sure what happened to the engine. But being able to shut the valve would have made for a LOT less grief.

Another thing to consider is what kind of jack and lug wrench you have on your tow vehicle. You can carry a spare tire on your boat trailer all day long but if you have no means of jacking it up and/or removing the lug nuts, you're outta luck. I picked up a bottle jack at harbor freight, both inexpensive and easy to store, and a collapsible lug wrench that came with 4 socket options. You can easily store them on the boat to always have them or store them on a "dedicated" tow vehicle.

Another thing to consider is what kind of jack and lug wrench you have on your tow vehicle. You can carry a spare tire on your boat trailer all day long but if you have no means of jacking it up and/or removing the lug nuts, you're outta luck. I picked up a bottle jack at harbor freight, both inexpensive and easy to store, and a collapsible lug wrench that came with 4 socket options. You can easily store them on the boat to always have them or store them on a "dedicated" tow vehicle.

Trayson makes a good point about knowing your boat. Had a friend over the holiday weekend ready to pack it in and head home early or drive 100 miles to the nearest dealer because they didn't have reverse on their Malibu. Spent all day on the water trying not to run into or over anything. (guess you don't realize how much you use reverse until you don't have it.)

It's the Malibu drive by wire setup - before he pulled out I suggested we at least take a peak. So I hopped in and took a look with him. Found an electrical plug going to the tranny had come off. Plugged in, tested, reverse works fine. Probably knocked loose when dewinterizing. While there I pointed out his thru hull shut offs and another mid point drain plug he was unaware of. Anyway the fix took all of 5 minutes.

I went easy on him with the razzing but was kinda shocked he didn't have a clue about any of it.